strength in little things

Not for tomorrow, or the weekend. I’m not talking about the forty pounds you want to lose by Easter. The music that has been sitting dormant inside of you all this time, that you finally decided is important to write and record. I’m not talking about the vacation you are dreaming of taking one day.

These are all wonderful things. They are wonderful goals, but their success largely depends what you do about them today.

We make things so complicated.

We wish to make these big, life sweeping changes, that will never work, and then we become so discouraged and depressed, to do the little things that will make all the difference.

I reflected yesterday on the wisdom of Mother Teresa.

Here was a woman, who at the beginning of her ministry, without television camera’s, without anyone’s help or money, despite local criticism and threats, went out early in the morning into the streets of Calcutta, and looked for the dying.

She didn’t want to do anything for them. She wanted to be at their side, as they lay dying. She wanted to offer her hand. To offer her words. To simply share her being.

“Be faithful in small things because it is in the that your strength lies”.

Strength lies in the ordinary.

Strength lies in the subtle.

God speaks in the quietest of whispers.

He shouts in silence.

I know that talking about God openly breaks some cardinal societal rule, and is bound to snap your bra, or give your britches a little twist.

It is a risk I have decided to undertake.

I now write and speak with conviction and will no longer apologize for anything. Take what you will, leave what doesn’t belong to you.

I have spent the first forty years of my life anticipating and searching for what I was supposed to say, with limited success, so I now, I am going to spend the next forty year, blurting out what’s on my heart. Right or wrong. And perhaps at times, a little spicy.

Our dreams share a room with an elephant.

Someone once asked an interesting question after the death of Howard Hughes, the man who made loans to his own country, in desperate times.

Someone once asked how much money, the billionaire, Howard Hughes left behind.

He left all of it.

And like him, you will leave everything behind also.

You are just like a billionaire because a King may indeed progress through the guts of a beggar.

You and him, are alike. No matter what you have or don’t have, you’re going to leave it all behind, too.

You can choose to be like Winston Churchill, and preoccupy yourself with your own legacy. You can pass laws and insist that nobody ever erect statues to your honour, because the prospect of being shat on by numerous birds, is not really in keeping with your bequest.

You can even get the birds of England to cooperate, by giving them nothing to fly over, but you have no such jurisdiction in the rest of the world. The birds of France, have never been notified, and secretly find the pleasure in painting all erected statues of Churchill, in beautiful enamel white.

We and I will die one day.

We don’t spend much time contemplating our final destination, and ironically, we continue to live our lives as though everything we do will last forever.

Think about today. What goals have you set for yourself?

What will you undertake that will inch you a millimetre closer to your dreams?

Happiness comes to those that realize that we are humanBEings, and not humanDOings.

No matter if you succeed or fail. If you reach our dreams, or die trying. If you sit idle, or run with fierce determination. You cannot be anymore magnificent than what you already are.

You can only change colour. You cannot stop being a charming chameleon.

There is nothing you can do today that will make you more like you.

Busyness is a defence mechanism to avoid the reality that we are going to die. It makes no sense to dream of luscious retirement and live a miserable existence trying to get there.

If we could just stop telling ourselves about all the things that we must do today, and focus on the strength of the little things we that really matter, perhaps we would be kinder, gentler, and a little more patient.

Patient with ourselves. Patient with each other.

Your strength lies in the little things you are going to do today.

Go make your coffee. Walk your dog. Take out the recycling, because it is Tuesday. Sing songs to your children at bedtime. Have a beer with a friend. Go shower, shave, and get yourself ready.